


Fever (You Set My Soul on Fire)

by SonaBeanSidhe



Series: The M Universe [17]
Category: Original Work
Genre: Fever, Gen, Sickness, They have no idea, a cat named godzilla, absolutely nobody is ready for what lies ahead, all aboard the nope train, and they only think things are bad NOW, as usual it sucks to be geezer, katje's clients have her back, of course you can't leave well enough alone, oh von rached, to know what's coming and be totally unable to stop it, you had the right idea gerald
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-12
Updated: 2019-12-14
Packaged: 2021-01-29 16:47:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 8,489
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21413416
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SonaBeanSidhe/pseuds/SonaBeanSidhe
Summary: Later — not very much later at all — the world would agree on one single thing: it began with the fever. Everything that followed — the wonderful, the terrible, and the seemingly impossible — had its roots in the sickness that defied all logic or explanation.
Series: The M Universe [17]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/185963
Kudos: 3





	1. The Sickness

Later — not very much later at all — the world would agree on one single thing: it began with the fever. Everything that followed — the wonderful, the terrible, and the seemingly impossible — had its roots in the sickness that defied all logic or explanation.

**Ratiri Duncan**

Ratiri couldn’t remember having ever been this sick.

He’d been a healthy child; the worst he’d ever dealt with was a bad case of strep throat when he was twelve. As an adult, there had been one, maybe two bouts of true influenza, but otherwise he’d been blessed with the same rude health his father had possessed (before the poor man’s angry, alcohol-abused liver turned cancerous, at least).

Now, though...it was fortunate he’d literally fallen ill at work, because he lived alone. The fever had felled him as abruptly as it had all its other victims, but fortunately for him, another doctor had broken his fall. It hadn't been nearly as fortunate for her, who, being much shorter, had been knocked over like a tenpin.

Things went fuzzy after that. He had a dim awareness of a line in his arm, and his vision occasionally focused on a bag of saline that shone with dark, diamond-purity under the dimmed fluorescent lights. The steady blip of the monitor told him his heart rate was decent, but he couldn’t focus on it — or anything else — for long. In his moments of borderline delirium, he wondered if someone had filled his joints with rusty razors when he wasn't looking.

Dimly, he registered the rustle of a shifted curtain, the metal hooks whispering over the rod. Ratiri had to blink a few times, because the brighter light from the hallway stabbed straight into his brain.

“It’s all right, Ratiri. I’ve just got more acetaminophen.” The soft, Estuary accent belonged to Angie Cohen, his fellow on the pediatric ward. She sounded beyond weary, and he was coherent enough to wonder when she’d last slept — and why she was bothering with the acetaminophen. Nothing they’d yet found had managed to mitigate the fever in the least, but apparently they had to feel like they were doing _something_.

Ratiri swallowed, but his throat was on fire, and he found it would produce no sound. At least she injected the medicine into his line, rather than try to make him take it orally. She was too pale, and the smudges of exhaustion beneath her eyes were so dark they looked like bruises. A faint aura, pale and clear as the saline, limned her, and he wondered if a migraine was about to punch him. It was welcome to try; by now, he doubted he could feel any worse.

Angie ran the thermometer over his forehead, the plastic cool and smooth against his skin. Her eyes widened when she read it, and she somehow managed to pale even further. “You hang in there, Ratiri,” she said, and there was a distinct tremor in her voice.

He had little choice but to do just that, struggling to curl up on the narrow hospital bed. It was too short for him; he stood a full six-foot-six, and his feet dangled no matter what he did. The thin hospital blankets were nowhere near enough, and the gown might as well have been made of paper, because he was so, so cold.

Consciousness took a brief holiday; when it returned, he hoped it had enjoyed the trip, because he certainly wished it had stayed there. How long it had been gone, he didn't know, but he’d gained no real rest. His limbs were still heavy with exhaustion, and neither thought nor vision would focus.

A nurse appeared at his side, but her voice was unfamiliar. It didn't really matter, for it wasn’t much time before his mind gave up; this time, when darkness took him, it kept him.

~

When awareness returned to Ratiri, it did it in slow degrees. He was no longer freezing, he realized, and the agony in his joints was gone — the fever had broken. It had broken, and he was still alive, which he’d probably be grateful for once he no longer had a catheter.

Opening his eyes took a great deal of effort, and he wasn’t sure the result was worth it; his vision swam, and refused to settle. God, how long had he been unconscious? Given the catheter, it had to have been at least a day. When he’d gone under, nobody who’d had the fever had yet come out of it — though at least nobody had died, so far as he knew.

“Somebody’s come back to the land of the living.”

Angie entered his view, fuzzy and indistinct. Ratiri blinked a few times, but his eyes didn't clear — if anything, his vision worsened. He could make out a few of her features, sure, but she was surrounded by a faint light of shifting green and blue. It was lovely, really, even if there were threads of grey in it. It wasn’t like any migraine aura he’d ever heard of (or experienced, for that matter), and there was a distinctive lack of headache.

_Silent migraine_, he thought, but there was no conviction behind it. Instead he tried to speak, and failed entirely.

“You just stay put.” The head of his bed raised, and Angie pressed a plastic cup of ice chips into his hand, which felt so weak he could scarcely hold it. “You gave us a bloody scare, Ratiri Duncan — even more than all the others.”

He managed to get an ice chip in his mouth without dropping the cup, which he counted a win. Its chill was a blessing against his tongue, and it soothed his dry throat enough to let him form actual words. “How many died?” Jesus, he sounded like someone had taken his vocal cords and given them a good scrubdown with lye.

“That’s the thing,” she said, even as she fussed with the empty bag of saline, “we haven’t lost anyone. I don't know if it’s the same everywhere, but we haven’t had a single fatality.”

Ratiri’s vision might be bolloxed, but there was nothing at all wrong with his hearing. Angie’s tone was one he recognized all too well: gratitude and unease in equal measure. It was the tone only used for inexplicable recovery, because ignorance of the cause meant they didn't dare hope that it would last. All too often, it didn't.

“Complications?” he asked, around a second piece of ice. The shimmering light remained, even as his eyes finally decided to do their job. “Neurological?” It occurred to him that he might well have had a stroke, especially if his fever had been high enough.

Angie winced. “Um, you might say that. Sort of. Look, Ratiri, you just stay here, and if any men in suits show up and ask you questions, crazy questions...just say no, all right? You were extremely sick and you’ll be a long while in getting well. That’s all anybody needs to know.”

She hustled out before he could say a thing. Just what the hell had _that _been? Angie wasn’t a nervous one, though she was probably still exhausted. Crazy questions...it wasn’t like he could answer anything that might be asked. Of his illness, he honestly knew nothing.

He set the plastic up on the tray beside his bed, and stared at the ceiling. The fluorescents were dimmed, which was just as well; he didn't want to know what full brightness would have done to his eyes. The fingers of both hands wiggled easily, as did his toes, and he could raise and lower both arms and legs. He could even touch his nose with each index finger, which gave him some hope that there hadn't been any stroke. If it was an aneurysm, he’d be dead.

_Okay, probably not a stroke. What else? _The brain was an extremely complex organ, and it regularly demonstrated some new way in which something could go wrong. Ratiri was too tired to even attempt to sort it out.

There came a knock at the door. “Doctor Duncan, are you awake?”

Ratiri blinked, hard. “I am,” he said. “Technically.”

Without waiting for permission, a man in a tidy suit pushed the curtain back. A small man, trim and fit, with something that seemed to be a mobile in his right hand. Behind him was a second, just as tidy, though rather taller and broader. And both of them bore outlines of shimmering light.

Ratiri blinked again, but the auras remained — paler than Angie’s, colder, and both as grey as their suits. Oh damn, something really _had _gone wrong…

“We just need to ask you a few questions,” the smaller man said. His accent was hard, clipped, and so aggressively RP that it was obviously not his natural accent. There was nothing at all menacing about him; he seemed, honestly, rather fussy.

“I’ll try to answer them,” Ratiri said, “but I’ve literally only just woken up five minutes ago.” The ice might have soothed his throat, but his voice sounded no better.

“This won’t take long.” Although there was a plastic chair not far from the bed, neither man sat. “Have you noticed any changes?”

“Changes in what?” Ratiri asked. “I feel like it wouldn’t take more than a breeze to knock me over.” The lights still shimmered, but he had enough wherewithal to say nothing. He wouldn’t have said anything even without Angie’s bizarre order, because he really wanted these two to go away.

The men looked at one another. “We’ll come back later,” the smaller one said. “Meantime, get some rest.”

The pair were gone so swiftly that Ratiri honestly wondered if he’d hallucinated the entire encounter. Obviously he needed more sleep.

~

**Lorna Donovan**

Lorna had steadfastly refused to go to her sister’s when the fever hit, because she hadn't thought it would be anything serious. 

At first, it wasn’t; she took her paracetamol, drank plenty of herbal tea, and curled up on the sofa to watch cat videos on YouTube. Sure, it was unpleasant, but nothing to fuss over.

Then day two hit.

When she woke on the second day, she was not, at first, certain she’d actually woken at all. She was freezing, clammy with sweat, and her mind and her eyes felt so heavy that she couldn’t move. The light dimmed and brightened at seemingly arbitrary intervals, which was oddly irritating.

Movement wasn’t to be thought of, until her bladder grew too insistent to ignore. It took every ounce of strength she had to leave her soft (if sweaty) bed and haul herself to the toilet, leaning against the wall for balance. The seat felt like it had been carved out of ice, but she was pretty sure her piss was close to boiling. 

When she’d had her wee, it took her a moment to summon enough energy to drag herself to the sink. She had a dim idea that brushing her teeth might make her feel a little better — until she caught sight of her reflection, and staggered backward.

It was no real surprise that her face was red with fever, but Christ on an actual bloody bike, there were _blisters _around her mouth. She leaned heavily against the counter as her blurry eyes tried to inspect them — they were little bumps, hard and white, painful when she touched one. 

_Yeah, nope._ Apparently her brain decided that was all a bit much, because her vision fuzzed grey, and she found herself on the floor before she could even register the vertigo. Awareness wandered away, and left her just conscious enough to realize how fucking much her joints hurt, even apart from her collapse. _Just...fuck._

Eventually, something like actual thought pierced her muzzy brain: _Jesus, Fun Size. _Three words, and odd ones, but they sounded like Mairead. Trust her sister to come make sure she wasn’t dead, because god bloody forbid she use the telephone like a normal person.

Strong hands — cold hands — lifted Lorna off the floor, as easily as though she were a child. Given Mairead was pushing six feet and Lorna herself hadn't even cleared five, it was no wonder, really.

She tried to say something, but her brain wouldn’t even supply actual words. There was fear now, churning through her brain like shards of glass in oatmeal. Cold fear, dark and heavy—

—_ why didn't you come to my house dammit you little eejit —_

_I didn't need to, _Lorna thought, but the words wouldn’t reach her throat. _Not then I didn't—_

Abruptly, she found herself back on her bed, on top of the sweat-soaked duvet. A fleeting thought of laundry passed through her mind as swiftly as it came.

_— Doc Barry’s going to skin her —_

Mairead was gone, and Lorna had just enough time to wonder if she’d been there at all before her sister’s voice floated through the door. Something about fevers and eejits and could the doc come out to the cottage, or should they drag Lorna straight to the clinic? 

_No. _No, she didn't want to — she couldn’t leave her cottage, her home, her safety zone. It was just a fever, just a bleeding stupid fever that wasn’t enough to knock her down, because nothing ever knocked her down, not like this—

“I’ll get her together before you get here.”

_You. Who? Who’s you? _

“No,” Lorna managed, somehow. _No, I’m not going anywhere and you can’t fucking make me it’s not safe. _“Stay.”

Something in her mind shifted, because suddenly she saw herself through Mairead’s eyes — a tiny woman in an ancient, oversized Judas Priest T-shirt, long hair a sweaty tangle and eyes glassy with a fever that might just be broiling her brain. Oh shit, was that really what she looked like? Was that really her? No, that wasn’t her, she wasn’t Mairead and she couldn't see things like that—

Her mind checked out at that point, and didn't find its way back until she was laid out on a gurney — an actual gurney, was that really necessary? She’d be fine. She’d be _fine_, if only everyone would leave her alone.

_— hospital — _

“No point.” Doc Barry’s voice, heavy with the tones of Limerick. “Busy —” nope, there went Lorna’s brain again.

“The blisters—”

“— saline...everything we can.”

God, no more fear, _no more_. Christ, how was she to handle it if it pressed in from all sides? How could she stand it, how could she even fucking _breathe —_

_— there she was again, but not through Mairead’s eyes. She could see Mairead too, her face milk-white beneath her freckles. Jesus, she didn't need to look so scared, everything would be all right once Lorna was done baking like a Sunday roast._

More fear, more cold, but now she was inside again. Somewhere along the way her shirt and shorts were replaced with soft dry cotton, and now there was a little thread of relief, of hope. She’d hold onto that, so long as she was cognizant enough to hold onto anything at all.

~

“Mam, I think she’s waking up.” Was that Niamh, the younger niece?

“Good. It’s about time I was able to give out at her for being so stubborn.”

Before she’d even opened her eyes, Lorna smiled. It was tired, but it was a smile nonetheless, because she was warm and dry and no longer felt like someone had shoved razors anywhere razors shouldn’t go (which was pretty much everywhere, but she couldn't think of a better metaphor). “Had to try.”

“Try to give me heart failure, more like.” Mairead’s face was as weary as her voice, pale and pinched with worry. “You’re staying with us, and I won’t have any argument. Jesus, Fun Size, you had a fucking _seizure_, your fever was that high.”

Lorna blinked up at her. “I what?”

Mairead rolled her eyes. “Seizure, Lorna. Apparently they can happen when your temperature’s gone over forty-one degrees.”

“Doc Barry says you’re lucky to be alive,” Niamh added. The girl was her mother in miniature, freckled and violently ginger.

“_Hush_, you. Go on out and tell your brothers and sister.” Mairead shooed her away, shaking her head.

Oh, good Jesus… Lorna fought the urge to draw her blanket up over her head, because there was too much going on in it. _Seizure_, her sister said, but along with it came an echo of terror Lorna herself was too exhausted to feel. Tangled among it were things like _almost lost you _and _eejit _and _god don't you dare ever do that again you little shit —_

That thought was so complete, and it sounded so very _Mairead _that Lorna was laughing before she knew what she was doing. She’d often heard echoes of her gran at the back of her thoughts, but Mairead was a new one. 

“You can come up with better than ‘little shit,’” she said. Her throat felt like she’d swallowed a load of asphalt and then sicked it right back up, but at least she could speak. Sort of.

“Oh, trust me, I will,” her sister said, and paused just a moment before shaking her head. “Doc ought to release you by the end’v the day, if you can manage to not die.”

Lorna stuck her tongue out, because she was an adult. Honest. She had a driving license to prove it, somewhere.

“Mature. Don't move.”

Since moving didn't seem at all appealing, Lorna actually did as she was told. Recuperating at Mairead’s wouldn’t be bad at all, even if there were a lot more people than she was used to living with — the bed in the spare room was nice enough, and there were two magnificently fluffy cats to keep her company. (Mairead had made the mistake of letting the kids name the kittens, and as a result the poor things were called Godzilla and Mothra.)

_The cold’s outside, _she thought, _and so’s the rain. _The room lacked a window, so she had no idea if it was raining or not, but it was Ireland — the balance of probability tilted toward ‘yes.’ She was warm and dry and at least no longer sick, even if she did feel like she’d been tossed off a cliff into the sea and dragged back in a fishing net.

— _glue those cats to her if it’ll keep her in one place — _the thought was accompanied by mental images of the cats, Lorna, the spare room, and a roll of duct tape, all jumbled together. If the fever had gone and fried her brain to the point of hallucinating, she was going to be very annoyed...eventually. For now, she’d settle for some tea, if somebody would be nice enough to give her one.

Niamh snuck back in through the door, with her siblings at her heels. The four of them ranged in age from ten to sixteen, and had spent four years being enabled in mischief by their surprise aunt. None of them had known Lorna existed until she was twenty-eight, and vice versa; she’d come to her sister’s home only after the wreck that killed her Liam, and left her with no one.

Kevin, youngest of the quartet, sat on the end of her bed. He was still a little lad, sandy-haired like his da, and he looked at her with an expression that suggested he didn't quite believe she was really alive.

“Come on, I can’t look _that _bad,” she said — but no sooner had she spoken than she caught an image of herself, a picture from his perspective. She looked absolutely terrible, ashy-grey and hollow-cheeked. How long had she been ill? Surely she didn't look _that _bad—

Kevin blinked, and Lorna’s own vision went momentarily dark. Dread and disbelief churned in her chest — disbelief, because there was no way she was actually seeing anything through her nephew’s eyes, and dread for no logical reason at all. She was just tired, that was all. Some rest and tea and she’d be right again, back home in her cottage and at work in the pub. Christ, how the hell were Jamie and Michael handling it, being down a bartender?

_Don't get used to it. _This thought was wholly hers, pulled from somewhere in the depths of pure instinct. _Be ready. _She had a terrible, irrational, and totally inescapable fear that her life was about to get much, much worse.

~

**Kajte DaVries**

Fortunately, Katje’s client had gone before she started to feel really ill. She’d woken with a cold, and called Adlar to cancel their appointment — there was no point in getting him sick as well, and she hardly looked her best right now. 

Adlar, bless him, had come to her flat anyway, but only to bring her soup and tea. “You rest,” he said, “and you call if you get worse. I mean it.” He was such an earnest man, and he had no family himself — the classic driven businessman who hit his thirties and realized that while he had plenty of money, he had no close _people _in his life. Katje had taken him on because really, he just needed to figure out how to talk to a woman and he could get an actual girlfriend. He wouldn’t be the first contract she’d taken for that very reason, and he would surely not be the last.

“You’re sweet,” she said. “I would ask you in, but I am afraid to breathe on you.” Her voice had shifted from sultry to hoarse.

“I would rather you rest,” he repeated. “And I mean it — call me. If I’m at work I can still send someone.”

She waved him away with a promise and an air kiss, and retreated into the warmth of her flat. Any sensible escort kept an appealing flat, but hers was actually homey — no animal print fabrics or anything like that, and furniture that was comfortable rather than showy. 

The soup smelled wonderful — minestrone, if she wasn’t mistaken — so she’d shuffled her slipper-clad feet into the kitchen. Few of her clients ever got to see the huge, fluffy, soft, and entirely unsexy red bathrobe she was currently swathed in, but she was alone and she was going to be comfy, god dammit. Shivering, she pried the lid off the glass container — this hadn't come from any supermarket, that much was certain — and actually managed to eat the better part of a bowl before she wanted to do nothing more than crawl into bed.

Once she’d tidied her kitchen, she did just that. The robe might be unsexy, but it was nothing compared to the flannel pajamas she wore beneath it — they were thick, soft, warm, and a hideous pink-and-green plaid that really shouldn’t exist.

Admittedly, her bedroom was somewhat more in line with what one might expect from someone in her profession: lots of silk and dramatic lighting, but the satin sheets had been banished in favor of flannel, and the mattress was like a cloud. (It ought to be, given she’d spent two thousand euro on it.) Her achy, fevery body snuggled down into a nest of sheets and satin duvet, and she fell asleep before she could feel any worse.

~

“Katje. _Katje_. Katje, you wake up now.”

Katje groaned, and cringed at the pain in her throat. Oh god, _why _should she wake up? She felt absolutely horrible — she hadn't been this sick since she was a little girl, and caught a dose of tonsillitis that had ended in an emergency tonsillectomy. Who was here — who was bothering her?

Something plastic rolled over her forehead, and she was dimly aware of a beep. “Katje, can you hear me?”

The voice, she realized, was familiar — Liesje. Liesje, her client — Liesje the doctor, whose family had no idea she was a lesbian. Who had called her? A number of Katje’s current clients were friends with former ones — she tended to find them by referral — but how was she here? _Why _was she here? Shouldn’t she be at the hospital?

“Katje—”

“Yes, I hear you.” Katje’s voice gave out at ‘you’, but still. Speech had happened. She was so cold and so tired, and _why _did anyone have to bother her? She must look awful right now.

“Katje, I need you to sit up. I need to listen to your heart.”

“You wouldn’t answer the phone.” Adlar. Maybe he had called Liesje — she was one of the few people who had a spare key to the flat. “You wouldn’t answer the phone, or the door, and I was worried.”

“He was not the only one,” Liesje muttered. 

Whatever had or hadn't happened, she needed to pee. Badly. “Bathroom,” she croaked. “Bathroom now, heart later.” She didn't care if it was about to explode, so long as she got to pee.

Liesje helped her to her feet, and she tried not to think about just how much mystique she was probably losing in this state. The marble floor was cold beneath her bare feet, but she managed to take care of the necessities and even wash her face (no moisturizers, though, because she just did not have the energy). 

“Katje, I think you need to go to the hospital.” Liesje’s pale face swam before Katje’s eyes. “Your fever is very high.”

“What if it’s _the _fever?” Adlar’s voice was low, heavy with anger and worry. “Liesje, if they’re in the hospital —”

Whatever he said next was a mystery, for Katje’s consciousness slipped a little. Sitting upright was just too much effort, and she slumped against Liesje. The woman’s skin was so soft, and smelled very faintly of rose water.

“And if she seizes? Adlar, I have _nothing _here — no saline, no—”

Again, sound faded, and Katje was dimly aware that someone was taking her frigid, sweaty top off. It was only a pity she was in no condition at all to appreciate it.

“You know what will happen if she’s got something,” Adlar hissed. “Something obvious.”

Katje scowled. She didn't have any _diseases_, thank you very much — she was very careful about that. The air was so chilly against her skin, but one or both of them wiped at her body with damp cloths. They were even chillier, but it felt better than stale sweat.

“Help me, with the tub, then. Her fever must come down _somehow_, and then she needs to drink. Go, fill it with lukewarm water.”

An absolutely frigid metal circle pressed against her chest, and it took a moment for her unsteady mind to realize it was a stethoscope. Liesje had something of a kink for them, and they could be surprisingly fun if you got creative. There was definitely nothing enjoyable about it _now_, however.

“Yes, I know this is no fun,” Liesje said, “and it will be even less fun soon, but we have to get your fever down somehow.”

_What the hell does that mean? _Katje didn't have the energy to ask aloud, or even to help when Adlar took her trousers off. She had a hazy, dim annoyance that she hadn't shaved her legs in two days, but she didn't care and she doubted they did, either.

Somehow both of her clients got her onto her feet again — not exactly easy, given she was quite a bit taller than Liesje, and nearly of a height with Adlar — and brought her, stumbling, into the bathroom. She had no idea what they meant to do until she found herself lowered, feet-first, into a tub of water that felt as frigid as an Arctic sea.

Katje tensed, and jerked away — at least, she tried to. Liesje caught her before she could climb out of the tub. 

“Katje, I know this must feel awful, but you need it. Your temperature is over forty degrees.”

“Forty?” Surely that couldn’t be right — not when she felt so terribly cold, half-submerged now in the icy water. “Why is this so —”

She couldn't finish the question. She couldn’t even fight Liesje’s gentle but incredibly firm hold on her shoulders.

“It’s not cold, Katje, it just feels like it because your fever is so high. Five minutes and we will take you out.”

A hand — Adlar’s, she thought — brushed the tangled, sweat-sticky hair back from her forehead, only to snatch itself away a moment later. She was vaguely aware of a startled hiss.

“God, Liesje, she’s burning.”

“Hence the bath.” Katje fancied she could _hear _the poor woman rolling her eyes. “Get some panadol, if she has any. It’s better than nothing.”

Perhaps he went, or perhaps he did not; Katje was too distracted by the sudden rush of chilly water through her hair to notice. Liesje’s soft hand smoothed it over her forehead, and her face.

“I know this will be hard, but Katje, when we take you out, you need to drink water — as much as you can. Keep sipping, even if you aren’t thirsty.”

Thought of eating or drinking anything at all was almost too much to bear, given the pain in her throat, but Katje was in no condition to argue. She was just pathetically grateful to be brought out of the tub, limp as a noodle and helpless as a baby. Somehow, she found herself dried and dressed in clean pajamas, soft cotton that was nowhere near warm enough. She shivered so hard she was sure her bones would break apart, but Adlar caught her before she could burrow back under her duvet.

“No,” he said, and she suddenly had a glass of water pressed into her left hand. “Take this, Katje and drink.”

Her throat was so sore that she could barely swallow the pills, and sipping at the water was pure torment. When unconsciousness took her again, it was a mercy.

~

How long she slept, she didn't know, but Katje woke feeling much less awful. Exhausted, wrung-out, but at least she no longer wished she was dead. 

A trip to the bathroom made things even nicer, though her reflection looked like absolute hell. Once she actually felt like a human, it would be time for some serious self-care.

When she stumbled her way back out into her bedroom, she found Rien beside her bed. Liesje or Adlar must have called him, because he worked from home and could most easily stay with her. He was no longer her client — he’d graduated from the Katje Academy of Women 101 — but they’d stayed in touch.

“You should eat,” he said, “and rest.” His expression was calm, but he was pale, and even tired as she was, she did not miss the strain in his voice. 

“I’m not hungry,” she said, though even as she spoke she realized that wasn’t true — her stomach gurgled audibly even as he helped her out to the sitting-room, and got her settled on the sofa with a fuzzy red blanket.

“Of course you aren’t,” he said, and she doubted she imagined the relief in his tone. “Some broth, at least, and toast if you can manage it. I will change your bed.”

Somehow, food happened before she could say a word, and she even managed to eat some of it before she fell asleep again, curled in a ball on the sofa.

When she woke once more, she found Liesje beside her, tension written in her every line. “Katje, when you feel better, you need to go,” the woman said, low and urgent. “You have a passport, yes?”

Katje nodded, but her abused, half-cooked brain refused to fully comprehend any of that.

“Go, then. Go to Canada — get far away from Europe. We’ve all pooled money for you to stay somewhere, until things blow over.”

“What things?” The words were almost lost in a yawn. “Liesje, what in fuck are you talking about?”

The woman looked at Rien, who looked back with an expression Katje didn't like at all. It wasn’t just worried — there was actual fear in his hazel eyes.

“Things are happening to people who had the fever,” Liesje said. “Strange things. I don't know why, but I _do _know men have come and taken all the patients away, even when they’re better. Nobody knows where they go, not even the families. If they know you had it, even now you’re over it…”

“They started shooting people,” Rien added. “The news suppressed it, but I’ve heard things online. You’ll be safe in Canada, until things...stabilize.”

Katje’s eyes flickered from one to the other, and dread coiled cold within her.

~

Three countries, three illnesses, and three people as yet unknown to one another. One man whose vision is filled with auras delicate as an aurora, one woman whose mind is no longer her own, and another woman still in ignorance of the curse bestowed upon her spirit, legacy of that strange sickness. None yet with any inkling of what awaits, of the hideous trials that lay ahead of them. 

The fever is only the beginning. 


	2. The Side-Effect

**Gerald Hansen**

Secrecy. Secrecy was safety, or so Gerald’s mother had said. It was why their family had survived so long. (If she was to be believed, it had been a gift much like his own that kept his granddad from getting lynched. The man had lived into his seventies, though he inconveniently died before he could teach Gerald much at all.)

In all honesty, secrecy hadn't exactly been hard. They lived in a world where damn near everyone would turn their own mind inside out to rationalize away something that ought to be impossible, and his gift wasn’t exactly flashy. There were times it utterly _sucked, _but it was as invisible as any gift could be. Nobody was likely to wonder why his presence lightened the mood in a room, or why he had a better bedside manner than anybody else in the hospital.

No, it hadn't been hard, but now each new case of fever added a pebble to the stony weight of dread in his chest. The idea that people could just...could just wake up with a gift went against everything Mama had ever told him, but what the hell were the odds it would be anything else? If she hadn't died of cancer the year before, he would have interrogated her.

His tiny apartment was stifling as he paced the living-room, heavy with Louisiana air so humid he felt like he could grab a handful and wring it out if he tried hard enough. The AC had choked to death on god only knew what, because apparently his day hadn't been bad enough. Sweat trickled in rivulets down his face, his back, but that dread was a cold thing — a chunk of ice in his soul, if not his body.

Somebody had come for the blonde girl today. He hadn't known her name, because she’d been brought in with no ID, but he doubted she was very far north of twenty, skinny as a rake and just as tall. She was burning, just like all the others, her freckled face so red she’d barely looked human, and her fever-glazed eyes didn't seem to take in him or anything around her.

He’d been so sure she’d die, but the fever broke: by the next day, she’d been lucid, if exhausted. She’d also started a very tiny, very localized rainstorm in the bathroom, and within twenty minute she was just...gone. Men came and took her away, despite the protests of himself and other staff members — men in grey suits, with a complete lack of what anyone might call an expression.

Secrecy.

Secrecy. Hiding in plain sight. Gerald had done it all his life, and he could damn well keep doing it. Empathy didn't do anything tangible, and he’d been taught to control it for as long as he’d been able to speak. He was safe. He was _safe_.

So why was he so afraid?

He stood still, and stared out the window. There had been less traffic since the fever took hold, which meant less exhaust to foul the breathless, sodden air. He had no reason to be afraid, and yet afraid he was, because instinct told him those men in grey wouldn’t care that he wasn’t like the others — if they clocked him for what he was, he was screwed, but dammit, they _wouldn’t_.

_Isolation, _he thought. He needed to get out of the city — he needed to get out of the country, if he could, and find somewhere in the middle of nowhere. The epidemic had to end sooner or later, so he could go without leaving the hospital in the lurch.

Still sweating, he took his laptop into the bathroom; it was the closest thing to a cool space in the entire apartment. If the wifi decided to cooperate, he could start making a list of potential places.

Secrecy. 

Safety.

He had an hour before he needed to leave for work, and he was damn well going to use it.

~

Unsurprisingly, Gerald found the the wards still busy as a termite mound. The alcohol scent of disinfectant was overpowered by the general, rotten-onion-odor of sweat and sickness; the medical staff were all used to it, but any patients lucid enough to register it wrinkled their noses.

So far as he was concerned, the smell was worth it just for the wonderful coolness of a functioning air conditioner. He’d showered before he left for work, but such was the humidity that he felt like he’d swum across the parking lot. His sweat would dry soon enough, which was more than could be said for their poor patients. More rooms had been crowded with extra beds and cots with each passing day, and this morning was no different. At this rate, they’d run out, and god only knew how they’d find more of either.

_Saline, _he thought, as he wove his way through the hallways. The quiet hubbub of voices was strangely soothing, and it made a very odd counterpoint to the sick-stink. What were they going to do, when they ran out of saline? In the height of their delirium, the patients were incapable of drinking on their own; if the saline ran dry, they might start seeing actual fatalities. The fact that they hadn't yet bordered on miraculous, but that couldn’t be counted on to last.

The crowd parted, and a brief ripple of silence fell — it followed a pair of men in grey, who between them carried a stretcher bearing a semiconscious young man. They looked at no one, and nobody dared question them. 

Heart in his throat, Gerald did his best to relax as they passed. Once again, he reminded himself that nothing about him stood out. True, the white staff outnumbered the black, but he was hardly alone, and he was physically...average. Average height, average build, his haircut short and unmemorable. 

Still, he held his breath until they passed, and forced himself to project an air of calmness as he began his round. The room that had held the blonde girl was now occupied by three people, red-faced and soaked with sweat, in various states of semi consciousness. 

If this damn fever continued its mathematical rate of acceleration, the men in grey would find themselves overwhelmed — if they hadn't already. What would they do, if everyone eventually came down with it? What did they do when one of _them _did? Gerald was fairly sure he didn't actually want to know.

_Secrecy. Safety. _Two words, a mantra, eventually followed by a third: _escape. _He just had to weather this, and bide his time, and get the hell out of anything resembling a city.

~

**Geezer**

The man with no name sat at the back of the bar, nursing his third beer.

He was a regular fixture, and he had been for the last year; he’d stay until he felt it was time to move on. He never knew when the itch to travel might strike, but it might be safest if he did soon.

“You gonna finish that thing?”

Faded blue eyes tracked to the barman’s. He was young — maybe mid twenties — but a good kid. He’d given Geezer a place to stay in exchange for odd jobs, and hadn't even mentioned anything about the twin scarred ruinations Geezer called hands. If the kid made certain he had jobs that didn't need fine motor skills, nobody needed to say anything.

“Workin’ on it. Helluva thing going on out there.” He jerked his head at the TV, which had been muted all day. Sound wasn’t really needed, given the text that crawled across the bottom of the screen. Every channel had it, and no two seemed to say anything like the same thing.

“I read on the internet it’s some government program that fucked up,” the kid said. “Like, some virus they made to destabilize a population.”

Geezer snorted. “If they did, it worked,” he said. He wasn’t about to tell the kid — or anyone else — that he damn well knew better. Oh, he didn't know the real cause, but he knew what it wasn’t, and it wasn’t that.

He stared down at the foamy depths of his beer, golden in the sunlight that slanted through the windows. “Kid, if you get the fever, don't go anywhere, you hear me? And don't take anybody to a hospital or doctor or anyone like that. Ain’t safe.”

“The hell? Why not?” 

There was a very odd note in the kid’s voice that made Geezer look up. “Think about it. Government didn't do this, but they’re sure as shit gonna overreact to it. It’s not just the fever, it’s what follows.”

The kid snorted, but there was doubt written beneath the impressive sunburn on his face. “What, the curses? You don't — I mean, you don't really believe that, do you?”

Yeah, there was real fear in the kid’s brown eyes — fear that made him seem a good ten years younger. For the first time that day, Geezer took a good, hard look at the kid — his red face, the sweat on his forehead. Yeah, it was kind of hot in the bar (air conditioner gone to shit, and the part they needed wouldn’t be there until next week), but…dammit.

“You’re sick, aren’t you?”

The kid looked away, and shrugged his bony shoulders. “I’ve felt better.” Hands that weren’t quite steady polished a glass that was in no need of it. “Probably nothing to worry about.”

Geezer’s eyebrows rose, and he sighed. Fuck everything. “Kid, you shut this place right now. If we get you home and resting, maybe it won’t be so bad.” He didn't believe that for a moment, and he doubted the kid did, either but it was something to say.

The kid’s apartment was directly over the bar; once he’d locked everything up and flipped the sign to Closed, it didn't exactly take long to get there and get him settled. The place had been an utter sty when Geezer first took up residence on the couch, but it was organized with military precision now. Sure, the collection of DVDs sat on a shelf made out of a board held up by two cinder blocks, and a square of milk crates covered in plywood passed for the coffee-table, but it was tidy.

“Go on, kid. I’m not much of a nurse, but I’m the best you got. If somebody comes asking after the bar, I’ll just tell ’em you shut it to keep the sickness out.”

The kid actually did as he was told, and Geezer settled himself on the sofa. An ashtray (made from a hubcap) took up one corner of the coffee-table, and he dragged it over before he tapped a cigarette out of the crumpled pack in his pocket. It would be a few days before he’d need to go get more, and by then the kid ought to be past the worst of it.

A flick of Geezer’s battered Zippo lit the cigarette, and the smell of lighter fluid joined the sharpness of the smoke. If the kid was lucky, he’d wake up with something he could hide, and nobody needed to be any the wiser. He had a sister, but Geezer didn't dare call her for fear she’d give something away, by accident or on purpose. She didn't ever need to know, either.

He propped his feet on the coffee-table. It might be that he was only delaying the inevitable, but it might not, either. His last prophecy-seizure had showed him a world that seemed to be at least half-ass okay; unfortunately he had no way of knowing when that would be. So often, the shit he saw didn't make any sense until it had already happened.

Would they get him, the Men in Grey? He had no way of knowing that, either, because the only future he never saw was his own. Logically, the answer was no; they were taking away everyone who’d been sick, and he wasn’t going to catch that fever. He’d been born with the sort of curse it was inflicting on so many — if he didn't have some kind of immunity, he’d be very surprised. Nobody looked twice at a broken-down old vet.

Not yet.

This wouldn’t stop with the fever. Geezer knew that much, at least; somehow, at some point, the fucking MiG would find a way to clock the cursed even if it didn't show. This wasn’t the sort of place they’d pay attention to, though, and the kid was like him in one way: he was beneath the notice of anybody who supposedly mattered. There was an upside to being the kind of person society didn't care about — when shit hit the fan, nobody thought about you, so long as you weren't an idiot who drew attention to yourself. Flying under the radar wasn’t too hard when people tried not to look at you, either out of fear you’ll attack them or beg for change.

_Get something invisible, kid. Hell, get invisibility, if that’s even a thing. _Geezer didn't know just how many different curses there might be, but they were probably going to find out soon enough.

Fucking wonderful.

~

**Raoul von Rached**

For the first time in decades, Von Rached found something well and truly _interesting_.

He had always known that others like himself existed, rare though they were. As he understood it, magic ran in families, or had once done; so far as he had been able to discover, both sides of his family were now long dead. Even the aristocracy in the normal world had an unfortunate habit of inbreeding itself to extinction, and among his kind there were even fewer of those to go around. If they had been at all like his mother, it was no real loss.

This fever, however…

Von Rached was not about to bother with the news, or even the CDC feeds he should not technically have access to. No, he sought the man who was supposedly some combination of superior and handler, as if anyone could actually control him. Letting them believe that made his life less annoying, so he allowed it.

Andrew Crupps lived alone, in an expensive flat in an upscale neighborhood of America’s capital city. It was exactly what one would expect of a civil servant devoid of any real imagination or creativity: pure white carpet, flat white walls adorned here and there with bland watercolors for which he had no doubt paid a fortune. Even the _sofa _was off-white. The occasional splash of color — a replica Ming vase with an artificial fern, a Persian rug in red and gold — only offset the sterility.

The man himself had no idea his home had been invaded until there was quite suddenly a Von Rached in his kitchen, where there had been no Von Rached a moment before. He jumped, swore, and dropped a jar of marinara sauce that shattered upon impact with the (white, of course) tile floor. The resultant mess looked remarkably like blood.

“I— I didn't hear you knock.” Crupps swallowed, but rallied himself. He was a tall man, and reasonably fit for his forty-odd years — not normally someone who was easily unsettled, but just now he was pale as his anemic flat. 

Von Rached arched an eyebrow. “I didn't bother,” he said. “It hardly matters — you won’t remember this anyway. Hold still, Andrew, and this will be over much sooner.”

He stepped over the mess and broken glass, while the wide-eyed Crupps fought an urge to flee and just barely won. “This really isn’t — you should make an appointment…” The words trailed off, and he went both still and calm, his mind wrapped in an artificial haze of serenity. It made it extremely easy for Von Rached to enter it, and look about as he pleased.

_Every mind he had ever inspected was different, but there was one thing they seemed to have in common: some manner of inner landscape. The person themself was often entirely unaware of it, but it was blatant enough to Von Rached._

_Crupps’, naturally, was very like the sort of office in which he worked, and very nearly as impersonal as his home. His mind was tidy enough that Von Rached didn't need to rummage for long before he found what he sought._

_The human memory, he had found, could be an incredibly peculiar thing. Crupps’ conscious powers of recall were nothing remarkable, but the things he stored below the surface of his mind were far more complete. A mental file labeled ‘fever’ revealed a great many things the man himself likely would not have known he could retain, though the language was somewhat...less than professional._

Morbidity rate 30%?

Fatality rate, 0. How?

Alteration rate from fever: 100%

Known alterations thus far (terminology subject to change):

  * Pyrokinesis (fire)
  * Transmutation (conversion of objects to other objects?)
  * Flight (note: calling it ‘Superman Syndrome’ was overruled)
  * Chloropathy (plant manipulation of some sort)
  * Aura manipulation (how very New Age)
  * Clairsentience (reading the history of...everything. Note: subjects prone to suicide)
  * Aquakinesis (water. Note: calling it ‘Aquaman Syndrome’ overruled)

_Von Rached was somewhat disappointed that there were no telepaths among that number, but it was early days yet. While he had suspected the fever inevitably lead to the acquisition of an ability, it was useful to have confirmation that it was so thus far. _

Transmission vector unknown. 

Subject commonality...apparently nonexistent.

Recommended course of action: pray.

_Well, that was hardly useful. Von Rached could study this, once given funds and facilities. If anyone could divine the true source of the fever and its effects, it was him._

_Crupps was the key, and thus it was Crupps he would use. The man would forget Von Rached had invaded both his flat and his mind, but on the morrow he would convince everyone who would listen that it was imperative to study this phenomenon — and that only one person was qualified to do so._

_Yes, things were about to get far more interesting._


End file.
